Secrets from a Happy Marriage

by Maisey Yates

  Rachel forced a laugh. “No! No. I’m not going to do that. I’m not... I don’t have feelings for him or anything.” She blinked back tears. “This wasn’t my dream. But, Emma, you always were. You always will be. And you realizing your dreams matters to me.”

  “Your happiness matters to me, Mom.”

  Happiness.

  They could both have that. They both deserved it.

  Rachel was determined.

  She sank onto the bed and pulled Emma into her arms. Emma pulled her into a hug, and the two of them tipped sideways onto the mattress. Emma laughed, and her smile looked so much like Jacob’s it took her breath away.

  Rachel couldn’t help but smile back.

  Jacob was in her heart. In her daughter’s smile. In the young woman she was becoming. Strength and certainty—a gift he’d given her with his steady, loving parenting that had continued after his death. That most perfect gift.

  He was in the very walls of the house. The sound of the ocean against the rocks. Because this life they’d built, and the sounds, sights and smells of it, was forever linked to him. To twenty years of love, laughter, struggle, pain, loss and joy.

  Nothing could replace him.

  And dinner date or not, no one ever would.

  24

  I’m in trouble. If Mom and Dad find out they will never speak to me again. And he’s gone. I don’t even have an address for him. I don’t feel eighteen right now. I feel all of eight years old, and I’m terrified.

  —FROM A LETTER WRITTEN BY SUSAN BRIGHT TO HER SISTER, SEPTEMBER 1961

  WENDY

  Wendy had seen John Hansen’s name appear on the books a few days earlier, but she’d been so lost in her own personal haze that she hadn’t been able to process it.

  Anna still wasn’t speaking to her.

  Rachel was frosty. Only Emma seemed to have taken it all in stride.

  But when John appeared in the entryway of the inn on the day of check-in, she couldn’t ignore him. And she didn’t feel like she was in a daze at all.

  “Hello,” she said, grabbing hold of her necklace chain, and then immediately releasing it.

  She was acting like an insecure girl.

  “Good to see you again,” he said, nodding once. His voice was pleasantly deep, and his manner would have been reassuring if she didn’t find him so...unnerving. He had the slow, steady demeanor of a rancher, and she wondered if she had the right read on him. And then she wondered why she cared.

  He was the only guest in the house. Which was strange.

  “It’s...the wine-and-cheese hour,” she said. “Of course, you’re the only one. And you had the historical tour already.”

  “I’ll take a beer,” he said. “Is there a beer-and-pretzel hour if you’re the only guest?”

  “Sure,” she said.

  “And is there a chance that the innkeeper can join me? Since I’m the only guest?”

  She didn’t see why not, and part of her just wanted to sink into the moment. To quit...guarding herself quite so closely. Because of what it’d gotten her? Sure, she had managed to keep her walls up all these years, and she had maintained a facade for the town.

  She had never engaged in liaisons with guests, or anyone else for that matter. She had... She had shut down that part of herself a long time ago.

  And just for a moment, she wanted to let it go.

  She wanted to feel beautiful again.

  She felt like a failure right now. As if everything she’d worked for had come to nothing. Because Anna was so hurt, and her hurt was linked so tightly to Wendy’s lie. And Wendy had to wonder—for all Rachel would never say it because her love for Jacob would prevent it—if Rachel was hurt in many ways because of Wendy, too.

  If she had also married too young. And jumped into a life far too serious. If she should have let them be free. Given them wings instead of clipped them.

  For all she hadn’t meant to, it seemed that she had.

  Her birds were still in the nest. And didn’t that mean she hadn’t given them the strength to fly away?

  She was ruined inside. And that made her want to embrace this even more.

  She wanted to enjoy that a man was looking at her. In all honesty, she had thought that moment had passed. That she had let it go sometime back in her twenties, with lines and gravity and everything else stealing the chance of it ever happening again.

  But he seemed to think she was beautiful.

  And she thought he was pretty beautiful himself.

  There was no one left to protect, and the ones who had counted on her hadn’t been protected by her, anyway. And she knew exactly how the world worked. No smooth-talking cowboy type was going to change that.

  She wasn’t an eighteen-year-old working in an office, not anymore. She was a grown woman, a businesswoman, a mother. Someone who had built a life for herself. She didn’t need to be protected or supported. And it was that lack of need that made her feel so confident and easy right now. Like there was no reason to hold him at bay.

  “Yes. The innkeeper would love to join you for a beer.”

  “And since I’m the only guest, I feel like I should do the work of acquiring it. Why don’t you have a seat?”

  “Well, I’ll take you up on that.”

  He went toward the kitchen, and she could hear him moving around. She went into the sitting room, and sat in one of the antique chairs that was positioned in front of the window. The lace curtains were pulled back, and the weather stormed outside of them, the ocean a ferocious gray.

  He returned with two beers, and a bowl that contained pretzels.

  “I have a confession to make,” he said. “I brought the pretzels.”

  “Well, that was forward-thinking of you.”

  “I’m not much for wine and cheese.”

  “I am,” Wendy said. “But this is nice, too.”

  “If you want to have wine and cheese, don’t let me stop you. There is no problem with us each enjoying something different.”

  “This is different for me,” she said, taking the bottle from his hand and raising it slightly. “A nice departure.”

  “Well, then. Far be it for me to stop you.”

  He sat down in the chair across from her. There was ample space between them, and it shouldn’t have felt charged at all. But it did. They were alone together in the house, and that didn’t make Wendy feel scared or insecure. No.

  It was exciting.

  What a way to run from your problems.

  But she wasn’t in the mood to be chastised. Not even by herself. Perhaps most especially not by herself.

  “What brings you back here?”

  He shook his head. “I can’t seem to stay away. Loss makes you think a lot about your life.”

  “Yes,” Wendy said. “That is true. My—my son-in-law passed. A couple of months ago. It’s been... It’s been a difficult time.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. My father was an old man. It still makes you think, but it’s at least the order of things. It’s terrible when someone that young passes.”

  “It is. I agree.”

  “My wife died far too young,” he said. “It was... It was hell.”

  “I’m sorry,” Wendy said sincerely.

  “It was a long time ago now. You don’t get over it, but it fades. Or maybe it doesn’t. Maybe it’s just that everything around you is fresher. More real. Requires more energy. She’s with me still. She always will be. My first love, the mother of my children. That doesn’t fade.”

  “No, of course not.”

  “I couldn’t go on a journey when she passed. I had children to finish raising. I did that. They’re all in their forties now, with children of their own. Living all over the country. Which I suppose is evidence that I did something right.” He paused for a long moment. “I’m a ranche
r by trade. I don’t have much of anything to do with the sea. It fascinates me that my ancestors did.”

  So she’d been right. He was a rancher. “I’m sorry to hear about that. Your wife. The family fallout...”

  “I don’t even know what it was about. I’ve been collecting bits and pieces of information ever since my father died. It’s a hell of a thing, to realize that you left some things too late. Everyone that I could have asked is gone. And my only real connection is...this place. So I know it might seem a little bit crazy that I’m here, but it... It’s my only connection to the past.”

  She nodded slowly. “Funny you should mention family secrets.”

  “You have some of your own?”

  “Doesn’t everyone?”

  “Apparently.”

  “I’ve learned from your great-great-grandmother,” Wendy said slowly. “I’m sorry you didn’t know about her until recently because she was an amazing woman. I talk to her sometimes up here. Think about her an awful lot. She left everything she knew behind and she made a life here. I always thought I was like her. But Jenny was braver than I am. Jenny came here and shared herself fearlessly. And it’s how she found love. I kept my secrets. I kept people out. I let my daughters think a certain thing about their past. About my past. And...” She looked at him. “You were a good man, weren’t you? A good husband.”

  “I like to think I was.”

  “Were you faithful to your wife?”

  He nodded once. “Yes, ma’am.”

  Well, she would see just what he thought of her—really thought of her—in a moment. Like Anna said, maybe it was time for her to cope with what people would think of someone like her. Because while she had enough self-hatred to go around, she hadn’t had to deal with the hatred of others.

  “I had an affair with a married man. For years. I’ve never been married. I loved someone that I couldn’t have, and I... You know, I don’t know if his wife ever knew about me. I don’t know if I hope that she found out, and found someone better, or if I hope that I never got the chance to hurt her.”

  “Love makes fools out of all of us in time. And there are ample ways to be hurt by it,” he said.

  “You don’t sound shocked to find that out about me.”

  He shook his head. “Life is long, and it’s a hell of a strange trip. Besides, I’m not the same person I was even ten years ago. Much less thirty.”

  “I suppose that’s true. Though, I wonder who I would have been if I would have been up front about what I’d done. With my girls. With everyone. I can’t help but wonder. I punish myself all this time. Tried to make myself into something... Something else. Have you been with anyone since your wife?”

  His charcoal-gray eyebrows shot upward. “There’s a question. But, yes. I have been. It’s been a long time, like I said.”

  “Ever come close to getting married again?”

  He shook his head. “No. When my kids were young, there was no chance of that, and then... I don’t know. I got kind of accustomed to my own company. Can do whatever I want, go wherever I please. But you’ve been single a long time, you ought to understand that.”

  She nodded. “I do. I understand that well.”

  “And you know, now I’m free to go to a lighthouse bed-and-breakfast on a whim, whenever I feel like it, because I have people to help manage the ranch in my absence, and I don’t have anyone to question where I go.”

  “That doesn’t sound so bad.”

  “It hasn’t been. But sometimes it’s lonely.”

  “Sometimes it is,” Wendy agreed.

  “How about you? I figure the question is fair to ask back.”

  “No one,” she said. “Because I made myself into a lady of virtue, and I figured that I’d better live up to that.”

  “Well, that,” he said slowly, “is a hell of a lot of pressure to put on a man.”

  “Or an honor,” Wendy said. “Though, who said I was going to bestow it?”

  “Just wishful thinking, I suppose. Though, I have to tell you, I don’t think being with a man you find attractive is a black mark on your virtue. You seem like a pretty damned virtuous woman to me, Wendy, but then, I’m not sure that I’m an arbiter of virtue.”

  “I don’t know that I’m virtuous,” she said. “But I’m also not sure I care anymore.”

  She did feel like a teenager. Giddy and waiting for her first kiss, because she might as well be.

  And when he did lean in and kiss her, she melted, grabbing hold of him and clinging.

  She liked him.

  The whole feel of him. His mouth, his broad shoulders...everything.

  “I might not be a young man,” he said. “But I know what I’m doing.”

  And Wendy believed him.

  And for the rest of the night she was determined to focus on nothing more than all the things that John Hansen knew how to do with a woman’s body.

  25

  The man infuriates me. And he obsesses me. It wasn’t like this with Matthew. I have a sickness.

  —FROM THE DIARY OF JENNY HANSEN, MAY 21, 1900

  RACHEL

  It had been a very long time since she had gone out to a nice dinner. And it was a very nice dinner. It was a newer restaurant, one that tended toward fresh, farm-to-table type foods. And something she wouldn’t have necessarily pegged Mark for liking.

  “My sister told me this place was great,” he said after the server set the single-page menus down in front of them.

  She looked around the small dining room and saw people she didn’t know well, but vaguely recognized, and she felt oddly exposed. Like she wanted to get up and announce she was just out with a friend so they wouldn’t judge her for being here so soon after Jacob’s death.

  She wondered if Anna felt like that all the time. Like people were looking and knew her business everywhere she went.

  They didn’t know. They didn’t know Anna’s, and they didn’t know hers.

  They knew bits and pieces of their lives, but not the whole story, and from there they made up their narratives.

  It suddenly seemed deeply unfair.

  She shrugged off the feeling and turned her attention to Mark. She couldn’t help what people thought.

  They made small talk at dinner, and Rachel was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was. They might as well have been chatting in the hardware store. Yes, she learned some things about him that they wouldn’t have talked about there—including that he had been divorced for eight years now, and that he and his ex-wife were on decent enough terms, with visitation that had been worked out so that things were as easy for the kids as possible.

  “It wasn’t easy to get to that point,” he said, taking a sip of his wine. “But...once we did it was fine. She’s remarried, and he’s a nice enough guy. And, hey, if you can’t be happy together you should do your best to be happy apart. It’s better for the kids. To see us both happy.”

  “I suppose that’s true,” Rachel said.

  “It’s not how I wanted things to end up, of course. I meant to stay married, but there’s no use hanging on to the past. We’re almost friends now.”

  Rachel couldn’t imagine that. Except... With a guy like Mark, she could see how it would be possible. He was affable, and he was friendly. He seemed willing to roll with anything. He let her choose the wine, and he seemed happy to drink it.

  He ordered the steak and potatoes, because it was what he recognized, but didn’t make any disparaging remarks about anything else on the menu.

  He was nice.

  In a genuine way, not in that cloying way that made you suspect the kindness was more an oily film that clung to the top of entitlement.

  Plus, he didn’t strike strange sparks off of her. He didn’t make her uncomfortable. He didn’t make her tense. When dinner was finished, he walked her to her car, and dropped an eas
y kiss on her cheek.

  And she was...fine with it.

  But she didn’t want to kiss him again, and she didn’t want to kiss him on the mouth. It was so easy that it was disconcerting. And when he asked if they could go out again, she said yes just as easily, because she would be happy to share a nice meal with him on any given day. It was so much easier than she had anticipated. Shockingly so.

  She had expected for it to feel conflicting and it hadn’t. Because it was just so perfectly and easily platonic.

  So maybe she didn’t need romance. And maybe she didn’t need sex.

  It was a relief. That’s what it was.

  She intended to drive home. But somehow, she found herself driving toward J’s.

  It was late, and the restaurant was probably closed. But Adam had been there the other night. Maybe he would be there tonight.

  When she pulled up to the front of the diner, she could see that he was. He was bent over a table, wiping it clean, his expression tense. And she wondered what made him tense when the diner was closed.

  For all that she talked to Adam on a regular basis, she didn’t know a lot about him. That was by design, it occurred to her. Because they had been a careful, safe space for each other for a good while now.

  Was she that for him? She felt so certain of it, all of a sudden. And with that suddenness came curiosity.

  Yes, she was curious. About him.

  The realization made her skin feel too tight. Made her dress feel too tight. Which made her feel self-conscious about her outfit.

  She hadn’t felt awkward at all earlier tonight. She had chosen the dress intentionally as something she hopefully looked nice in. And she had felt... It had been nice to feel pretty.

  But she hadn’t felt exposed. Somehow, imagining Adam looking at her in this dress made her feel just that.

  She walked up to the door and was about to knock when he saw her.

  His expression went from tense to wary. Then she wasn’t sure why she was inspiring wariness in him.

  But, apparently, she was.

  He straightened and made his way to the door slowly, then unlocked it and opened it.